DSDN 144 Project 2- Time

DSDN 144 Project 2 summary-

This is my final sequence of photos for DSDN 144 Project 2- Time. This sequence has undergone many drastic changes in areas such as the setting I used for the shots, the angles the photo's were taken from, and the colour range used. A total of 646 photos were taken and only the top 6 were selected after also reducing the sequence from 10 photos to 6. I chose to use these particular toys rather than more modern toys such as GI Joe and Barbie because they were relating too much to human life rather than the fantasies a child grows up on. I felt that these toys (Pokemon toys) worked a lot better than modern toys because they are more involved in child fantasy that are a lot more friendly because they're not as intimidating as GI Joe with a gun or Barbie with a kitchen knife. 

My photo set is based on the idea on "a toys experience as a childs best friend over time". This changed from my initial idea which was "what a toy experiences over time in the hands of a child". I went through this change in my photos because my set was leading to the ending of creating an abandoned feeling, and I felt this was shown better through this new idea rather than the old one.

My influences included a wide range. One influence was the Disney trilogy "Toy Story". Toy Story gave me the idea to do my project with toys because in the film, the toys all grow up with the main character Andy and after he's finished with them, ends up giving them away to another child. This climax gave me the idea to use this idea on the change in time (what a toys experience being a childs best friend over time is- Being loved and cared for like a best friend, but once it is no longer needed is discarded) because as we get older we tend to forget about our toys and not treat them with the care and respect children would give them.

Another influence was the artist "Elliot Erwitt". This particular artist model caught my eye because he managed to get right in close and flawlessly capture the subject he wants on camera. This technique is displayed through my 6th and final photo. In this photo I excluded most of the distracting background and made it focus solely on the toy that i'm using, much like how Elliot Erwitt focuses on the main object he wants to capture.

The artist "Bruce Davidson" is another artist I used to make my final photo sequence. In the 2nd and 5th photo, this is when Bruce Davidsons influence came in. Bruce Davidson aims to capture his photos at different angles rather than just at a front on angle, which is what I did for these particular photos. They are capturing which toy is the favorite toy and which toy is the one forgotten by the child in favor of the other toy. The use of experimenting with different angles like Bruce Davidson helped me display my idea on who is the more powerful toy much better because in the photos taken we can clearly see that the favorite toy is the one in the child's hands which is displayed well through the upper view of the camera.

"Michael Kenna" is another artist I took a liking too as an artist model. I really liked the way he used his background to his advantage to make his photos look stunningly beautiful and still make sure it doesn't look clustered with objects to achieve this. Michael Kennas influence came up in photos 1 and 3. I used the white in the back to help make my main section (my cousin Katie with the toys) stand out a lot more and display the subject simply and with little complications to it that make it over done.

My last influence was the use of looking at Pokemon manga or more commonly known as comics. The examples of how the pictures were drawn were inspirational to me as well as the use of comical symbols. The use of comical symbols was the most useful and inspirational to me because of the types of toys used in this set of photos. They're more of  child fantasy toys that are playing on a childs wonderful imagination instead of intimidating them like Action Man with a set of guns. I used the comical symbols to show certain things I want to have stand out in the photos such as what the toy is thinking and what the childs dreaming of. I feel that these comical symbols relate well to the toys because Pokemon originated from the Asia area and is also where the manga for this cartoon was created, bringing out a cultural side to the photos. The angles used in comics were used in photo 4. In comics the low angle is used to help display a sense of power. I used this technique for this photo to show that the old toy is slowly losing his power as the favorite toy and is being replaced by the newer toy, which is helping me lead to the idea of the first toy being abandoned for the new one.